Posts Tagged ‘Good Guys’

The Washington Post interviewed the brother of Michael Hrizuk, who died on July 2 of injuries received in a June 21 assault behind Good Guys (2311 Wisconsin Ave.). The brother, Bill Hrizuk, told the Post that his brother “fell and struck his head during an altercation.” The deceased was a married Air Force veteran and a retired air traffic controller, according to the Post.

Michael Hrizuk, 57, died of blunt impact head injury, the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner has determined. Hrizuk, an Arlington resident, died on July 2, two weeks after emergency personnel found him injured in the 2300 block of Wisconsin Ave. According to our sources, police were called to the alley behind Good Guys (2311 Wisconsin Ave.) shortly before 2 a.m. on Saturday, June 21. They discovered Hrizuk injured on the ground and took him to the hospital. His assailant is believed to be a young white male.

The Metropolitan Police Department currently offers a reward of up to $25,000 to anyone who provides information that leads to the arrest and conviction of the person or persons wanted for any homicide committed in the District of Columbia. Anyone with information about this case is asked to call the police at (202) 727-9099. Additionally, anonymous information can be submitted to the Department’s TEXT TIP LINE by text messaging 50411.

Metropolitan Police detectives are investigating an “undetermined death” on the 2300 block of Wisconsin Ave., according to a department press release.

Officers and emergency vehicles responded to a call for help shortly before 2 a.m. on Saturday, June 21, the release states. They found Michael Hrizuk, 57, of Arlington injured on the ground and took him to the hospital. On Wednesday, July 2, Hrizuk “succumbed to his injuries and was pronounced dead,” according to the release. The cause and manner of death have not yet been determined.

NBC4 has reported that Hrizuk’s injuries were caused by an assault, and this jibes with what we have heard. Although MPD Commander Michael Reese did not respond to our earlier inquiry on this matter, we’ve been told by two sources that the site of the incident was the alley behind Good Guys (2311 Wisconsin Ave.) and that Hrizuk’s assailant seemed to be a young white man.

The Metropolitan Police Department is asking anyone with information about this case to call them at (202) 727-9099. Anonymous information may be submitted to the department’s TEXT TIP LINE by text messaging 50411.

Good Guys (2311 Wisconsin Ave.) has promised not to apply for permission to create private dancing spaces for one or two patrons, under a formal agreement with Advisory Neighborhood Commission 3B. The club’s promise would obtain unless another strip club within two miles is permitted to create such spaces, or unless the law against strippers performing within three feet of patrons is changed. The formal agreement cleared the way for a three-year renewal of the club’s liquor license.

Good Guys has never applied for permission to create private dancing spaces. But last year, the neighborhood’s other strip club, JP’s Lounge (2412 Wisconsin Ave.), tried to gain permission from the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board to put dancers on small tabletops and in semi-private alcoves. The ANC opposed this application, which was dismissed when a JP’s representative failed to appear at a required hearing.

The ANC formally protested the Good Guys license renewal on the grounds that the club is not appropriate for such a family-centered neighborhood. It withdrew the protest in light of the February 24 compromise agreement, which also requires Good Guys to place a security camera outside its front entrance. In recent years, a few scuffles have occurred on the sidewalk in front of the establishment, and in 2007, a man who had been kicked out of the club for unruly behavior returned and started a fire that killed a young manager.

The agreement submitted to the Alcoholic Beverage Control Board included a third provision: that all Good Guys performers would use the building’s rear entrance before 5 p.m. (Good Guys opens at 11 a.m., while its competitor JP’s is not allowed to open until 5 p.m.) But commissioners struck that provision after a City Paper reporter suggested to them that it was discriminatory.* “Would fully clothed women who happen to strip for a living really destroy the family-friendliness of the neighborhood simply by walking on a sidewalk nearby?” asked Perry Stein in a March 7 story. In an email quoted in Stein’s story, commissioner Jackie Blumenthal wrote that the ANC’s main sidewalk concern is the behavior of club patrons, not staff. “It didn’t occur to me that using the rear door would appear to be discriminatory until you raised it,” Blumenthal wrote to Stein. “Thank you for making us rethink this issue.” On March 12, the ABC Board approved the compromise agreement without this third provision.

*The first version of this story erroneously reported that all three provisions of the submitted agreement had been approved.

“From Monday, Jan. 14 through Monday, Jan. 21, the D.C. Council is allowing some restaurants and bars to stay open 24 hours a day and serve alcohol until 4 a.m.,” The Washington Post reports. “Being authorized to stay open late doesn’t guarantee that a bar will definitely be open around the clock for a full week…. It just means an establishment can stay open later if the owner chooses, or if the place is booked for a special event.”

On the list of 154 bars approved for extended hours were four in Glover Park:

On New Year’s Eve, a man leaving Good Guys (2311 Wisconsin Ave.) encountered two other patrons smoking cigarettes outside, and he attacked one of them “for no apparent reason,” according to an Alcoholic Beverage Regulation Administration investigator’s report. The attacker said, “Sorry, I gotta do this!” before punching the victim repeatedly, the report states. The victim’s face was bruised, and the victim’s companion fractured bones in his hand while trying to break up the assault. The attacker fled north on Wisconsin Ave., the report states. The Alcoholic Beverage Control Board held a hearing on the incident and ruled in March that the bar was not at fault. As far as we can tell, no charges have been filed in the matter.

Vasile Graure, 41, who splashed Good Guys (2311 Wisconsin Ave.) with gasoline and set it ablaze in November, 2007, was sentenced Friday to 35 years in prison for the murder of a club employee, the United States Attorney announced. Graure is already serving a 30-year term for other charges related to the arson, in which the employee, Vladimir Djordjevic, was seriously burned. Djordjevic spent the rest of his life in the hospital and died of his injuries in May, 2010, at the age of 28.

“This additional prison sentence—on top of the 30 years that this arsonist is already serving—holds him fully accountable for burning a man to death,” said U.S. Attorney Ronald C. Machen Jr. “A club manager was doused in gasoline, set on fire, and lingered for years before finally succumbing to his severe injuries. A lifetime behind bars is just punishment for inflicting such needless pain on another human being.”